——I do appeal to authority.
You seek only your own.
If you refuse do access the vast amount of research that invalidates the concept of free will, there is no point in continuing this conversation
.

What a misinterpretation of my argument. I am referring to innumerable first person testimony and you reject all of it claiming it is all an illusion without any evidence whatsoever!

Your argument is based only on how you feel.

Amen!

If you have free will, I would hope that you choose health and happiness for yourself and your loved ones through eternity.

You’re not a good preacher!

Seriously, if you have free will, why don’t you choose to live your entire life in blissful happiness?
Why don’t cleanse your mind of those nagging little habits that you know are destructive?
Why not exorcise fear and hate from your thoughts?
Why not become a perfect human being?

Seriously, if you have free will, why don’t you choose to live your entire life in blissful happiness?
Why don’t cleanse your mind of those nagging little habits that you know are destructive?
Why not exorcise fear and hate from your thoughts?
Why not become a perfect human being?

Toombaru, are you basing your opinion about human will (to avoid the excessively used religious term, “free will” for just a moment) on certain conclusions coming from brain-function research carried out by neuroscientists? If so, then do you also assume that today’s neuroscientists know all there is to know about how our brains operate? If not, then how can you be so confident in your opinion?

Signature

Philosophy may in no way interfere with the actual use of language; it can in the end only describe it. For it cannot give it any foundations either. It leaves everything as it is.
Ludwig Wittgenstein

Seriously, if you have free will, why don’t you choose to live your entire life in blissful happiness?
Why don’t cleanse your mind of those nagging little habits that you know are destructive?
Why not exorcise fear and hate from your thoughts?
Why not become a perfect human being?

Toombaru, are you basing your opinion about human will (to avoid the excessively used religious term, “free will” for just a moment) on certain conclusions coming from brain-function research carried out by neuroscientists? If so, then do you also assume that today’s neuroscientists know all there is to know about how our brains operate? If not, then how can you be so confident in your opinion?

Free will or choice is a conceptual misconception.
The brain witnesses the results of its own reactions and labels its observations “choice”.
Do some research on the reality of the self.
Once its unreality is understood the question of free will becomes moot.
Free will is an extension of the egoic delusion or personal autonomy.
Actually you can be glad that human beings do not anything resembling freedom of choice.
If they dd, we would have killed each other off eons ago.

...Do some research on the reality of the self.
Once its unreality is understood the question of free will becomes moot.
...

I have proved the reality of the self. If you didn’t understand the argument, then please go back and read it.

Here’s the way Wikipedia explains it:

“Cogito ergo sum (French: “Je pense donc je suis”; English: “I think, therefore I am”) is a philosophical Latin statement proposed by René Descartes. The simple meaning of the phrase is that someone wondering whether or not he or she exists is, in and of itself, proof that something, an “I”, exists to do the thinking.”

The proof is very simple, straight forward and irrefutable. If I know anything at all, it is the existence of myself. Nothing can be more certain to me.

...Do some research on the reality of the self.
Once its unreality is understood the question of free will becomes moot.
...

I have proved the reality of the self. If you didn’t understand the argument, then please go back and read it.

Here’s the way Wikipedia explains it:

“Cogito ergo sum (French: “Je pense donc je suis”; English: “I think, therefore I am”) is a philosophical Latin statement proposed by René Descartes. The simple meaning of the phrase is that someone wondering whether or not he or she exists is, in and of itself, proof that something, an “I”, exists to do the thinking.”

The proof is very simple, straight forward and irrefutable. If I know anything at all, it is the existence of myself. Nothing can be more certain to me.

The self uses the self to prove the existence of the self and considers that proof.
Descartes was wrong.
All philosophical speculation is delusional.

...Do some research on the reality of the self.
Once its unreality is understood the question of free will becomes moot.
...

I have proved the reality of the self. If you didn’t understand the argument, then please go back and read it.

Here’s the way Wikipedia explains it:

“Cogito ergo sum (French: “Je pense donc je suis”; English: “I think, therefore I am”) is a philosophical Latin statement proposed by René Descartes. The simple meaning of the phrase is that someone wondering whether or not he or she exists is, in and of itself, proof that something, an “I”, exists to do the thinking.”

The proof is very simple, straight forward and irrefutable. If I know anything at all, it is the existence of myself. Nothing can be more certain to me.

The self uses the self to prove the existence of the self and considers that proof.
Descartes was wrong.
All philosophical speculation is delusional.

You obviously do not understand the proof. The proof merely relies on the experience of thinking. So it begins with an observation, namely “I am thinking”, and thereby comes to the conclusion: “I exist” What’s so hard about understanding that?

...Do some research on the reality of the self.
Once its unreality is understood the question of free will becomes moot.
...

I have proved the reality of the self. If you didn’t understand the argument, then please go back and read it.

Here’s the way Wikipedia explains it:

“Cogito ergo sum (French: “Je pense donc je suis”; English: “I think, therefore I am”) is a philosophical Latin statement proposed by René Descartes. The simple meaning of the phrase is that someone wondering whether or not he or she exists is, in and of itself, proof that something, an “I”, exists to do the thinking.”

The proof is very simple, straight forward and irrefutable. If I know anything at all, it is the existence of myself. Nothing can be more certain to me.

The self uses the self to prove the existence of the self and considers that proof.
Descartes was wrong.
All philosophical speculation is delusional.

You obviously do not understand the proof. The proof merely relies on the experience of thinking. So it begins with an observation, namely “I am thinking”, and thereby comes to the conclusion: “I exist” What’s so hard about understanding that?

...Do some research on the reality of the self.
Once its unreality is understood the question of free will becomes moot.
...

I have proved the reality of the self. If you didn’t understand the argument, then please go back and read it.

Here’s the way Wikipedia explains it:

“Cogito ergo sum (French: “Je pense donc je suis”; English: “I think, therefore I am”) is a philosophical Latin statement proposed by René Descartes. The simple meaning of the phrase is that someone wondering whether or not he or she exists is, in and of itself, proof that something, an “I”, exists to do the thinking.”

The proof is very simple, straight forward and irrefutable. If I know anything at all, it is the existence of myself. Nothing can be more certain to me.

The self uses the self to prove the existence of the self and considers that proof.
Descartes was wrong.
All philosophical speculation is delusional.

You obviously do not understand the proof. The proof merely relies on the experience of thinking. So it begins with an observation, namely “I am thinking”, and thereby comes to the conclusion: “I exist” What’s so hard about understanding that?

Your mind is made up…......................literally.

That should not be astonishing to you because according to your deterministic theory, my mind must be made up. consequently, I wonder why you try to argue with me in the first place!? The whole act of arguing with me seems to suggest that you don’t really believe that the mind is made up.

...Do some research on the reality of the self.
Once its unreality is understood the question of free will becomes moot.
...

I have proved the reality of the self. If you didn’t understand the argument, then please go back and read it.

Here’s the way Wikipedia explains it:

“Cogito ergo sum (French: “Je pense donc je suis”; English: “I think, therefore I am”) is a philosophical Latin statement proposed by René Descartes. The simple meaning of the phrase is that someone wondering whether or not he or she exists is, in and of itself, proof that something, an “I”, exists to do the thinking.”

The proof is very simple, straight forward and irrefutable. If I know anything at all, it is the existence of myself. Nothing can be more certain to me.

The self uses the self to prove the existence of the self and considers that proof.
Descartes was wrong.
All philosophical speculation is delusional.

You obviously do not understand the proof. The proof merely relies on the experience of thinking. So it begins with an observation, namely “I am thinking”, and thereby comes to the conclusion: “I exist” What’s so hard about understanding that?

Your mind is made up…......................literally.

That should not be astonishing to you because according to your deterministic theory, my mind must be made up. consequently, I wonder why you try to argue with me in the first place!? The whole act of arguing with me seems to suggest that you don’t really believe that the mind is made up.

I discuss simply because I, like all minds, have no choice.
The self is a program evolved to believe that it is real.
It helps the organism survive and reproduce.
Its is composed entirely of swirling mnemonic debris.
It is the imaginary center of the brain’s conceptual overlay.
Where was your mind before the body was born?
Where will it go when the body dies?

I hate agnosticism. I believe that it is usually evidence of not having sufficiently thought through an issue. Unfortunately, I can’t shake my ambivalence on this topic. I find the certainty of Dr. Harris and others on this point as obnoxious as the certainty of the theists. Harris failed to convince me in FW that there is no freedom of thought, but he did prevent me from continuing to assume that it does exist.

I think those who deny free will are calling the game early. I worry that they may be doing so disingenuously, since the absence of free will would provide a short cut to winning the debate on atheism. They don’t need a short cut, they’ve already won. Hopefully I’ll soon have a chance to get around to the ‘Illusion of Self’ that he has been promoting on his main page as that may help me to make a determination.

It seems to me that the case against free will rests on the ever narrowing scope of control that we have over ourselves which is relentlessly being whittled down by neurology. But no matter how limiting our biology and environment prove to be on this score, it does not follow that the end result will be zero control. If we have any self generated control whatsoever, it seems to me that that will provide all the room we need to allow for free will. Sam seems convinced that free will = zero, and he is a neurologist while I am not. However, though I have been convinced that the amount of control I intuitively feel is illusory (Kahneman) I have yet to be convinced that all control is an illusion.

I hate agnosticism. I believe that it is usually evidence of not having sufficiently thought through an issue. Unfortunately, I can’t shake my ambivalence on this topic. I find the certainty of Dr. Harris and others on this point as obnoxious as the certainty of the theists. Harris failed to convince me in FW that there is no freedom of thought, but he did prevent me from continuing to assume that it does exist.

I think those who deny free will are calling the game early. I worry that they may be doing so disingenuously, since the absence of free will would provide a short cut to winning the debate on atheism. They don’t need a short cut, they’ve already won. Hopefully I’ll soon have a chance to get around to the ‘Illusion of Self’ that he has been promoting on his main page as that may help me to make a determination.

It seems to me that the case against free will rests on the ever narrowing scope of control that we have over ourselves which is relentlessly being whittled down by neurology. But no matter how limiting our biology and environment prove to be on this score, it does not follow that the end result will be zero control. If we have any self generated control whatsoever, it seems to me that that will provide all the room we need to allow for free will. Sam seems convinced that free will = zero, and he is a neurologist while I am not. However, though I have been convinced that the amount of control I intuitively feel is illusory (Kahneman) I have yet to be convinced that all control is an illusion.

The root of the problem lies within the concept “free swill” or for that matter the word “will”.
The objectifying mind labels its perceptual input and then mistakes its own labels for reality.
When it observes its own actions, they appear to originate from it own “choices”.
Actually the neurons in the brain react to their uniquely evolved survival program and the sense of self emerges downstream from that process to claim the “choice”.
The sense of being a separate, volitional entity is a dream…...a conceptual overlay.
Find out how substantial the self is and the issue of free will becomes moot.

The root of the problem lies within the concept “free swill” or for that matter the word “will”.
The objectifying mind labels its perceptual input and then mistakes its own labels for reality.
When it observes its own actions, they appear to originate from it own “choices”.
Actually the neurons in the brain react to their uniquely evolved survival program and the sense of self emerges downstream from that process to claim the “choice”.
The sense of being a separate, volitional entity is a dream…...a conceptual overlay.
Find out how substantial the self is and the issue of free will becomes moot.

Hey…..........that’s a good name for a baby.

There is nothing wrong with the model, but that doesn’t give it a claim to truth - only internal consistency. As I see it, there is the same significant problem with both sides: What evolutionary path could lead to the emergence of [an illusion of/the existence of] free will? It would need serve a purpose, or be a vestige of some faculty evolved for some other purpose. Clearly, our neurological processes are creating one or the other,but I have yet to run across an argument that can help me to prefer one over the other. The only proposition I find convincing thus far is that we don’t have enough evidence to make the call.